Kurdish Thoughts

Welcome to Kurdish Thoughts, this blog is dedicated, to creating open discussions on all relevant Issues which effect Kurds and Kurdistan. We encourage all to critisize and comment on all of our posts, here you have the right to put all your views across as a Kurd, all non-Kurds are also welcome to comment and give us their views on all the relevant topics. Thank you

Sunday, February 13, 2005

The near future of Kurds in Iraq

So now we have the Iraqi election results, we can see at least in the short-run, where the fate of the Kurds and all Iraqis is heading and what key issues will be dealt with.

Firstly I have to congradulate my Kurdish brothers and sisters for their dedication and enthusiasm during the election process. However I must admit at one point I wasn't going to vote because I was very skeptical of Americas foregin policy towards our Kurdish nation. I still feel they may betray us but then who am I to predict the future? But anyway, thanks to some close friends and family I was able to see past my skeptisism and doubts and I saw that this was a historical event for our people and it showed how, although we live in such an unrighteous world, we as Kurds fight for freedom and truth, and for this reason I finally voted.

I was quite surprised at the results. Iraqi Shiite only got 49% of the votes and Kurds got more than expected. Our 26% has put us in a very powerful position for negotiations over the permanent Iraqi constitution, which no doubt there is going to be some serious conflicts of interests over. Also no doubt it is going to be the Kurdish demands which are going to be the center peice of the negotiations. We're going to be in a strong position to negotiate because not only did we get a considerable share in the national elections but we had the majority of votes in Kirkuk, Mosul and other regions which were previously subjected to "arabization". So this means it is the peoples "democratic" right, in the fore-mentioned regions to decide on their own future, because afterall democracy basically means power by the people for the people, and also America's reason for invasion is to spread democracy to Iraq.

Now my patronising tone in the past paragraph was due to the fact that it is obvious what our enemies are going to argue in this crucial process which will determine the future of Kurds and Iraq. They will oppose Kurdish demands for Iraq to be based on a federal system and also for Kirkuk to be part of the Kurdish "Federal" state of "IRAQ", and possibly even Mosul now that the majority of the votes were cast by kurds. Also they will oppose our demand for a Kurd to be president, because of course in our enemies eyes that is close to "blasphemy" and I wish I was being sarcastic.

Because the efforts of our Kurdish leaders who made sure that the Tranisitional Administrative Law (TAL), no one party in this new upcoming government can appoint members of the cabinet or the prime minister without a two thirds majority in the Iraq assembly. This means that the Shiites will have to look to us to make up that two thirds majority if they wish to have their man as the premier and also to write the consititution.

My happiness would be much greater however if we didn't have so many dogs barking at our doorsteps, who have no right to be making pathetic threats when they have no jurisdiction to be intervening in Iraqi affairs. The loudest of these dogs is Turkey, which will try any attempt to prevent Kurds getting any sort of power than what we have currently gained, and this is where my doubts stem from because will the main power in Iraq, namely the USA, side with its Kurdish allies or its older and more important Turkish allies?

This is my main question, and I'm still weighing up the USA's interests, well at least those that are apparent to the international people, so that I can come up with my own prediction for who they will place more priority with the Turks or the Kurds?

Well whoever the US decides to side with the outcomes in both instances will be evident. On one hand if America decides to go with Turkey and betray the Kurds, then of course that great old Kurdish habbit of rebelling against great powers will be seen on a scale larger than ever before, and they will have to fight the deadliest of guerilla fighters in the middle east. Forget about the Islamists, they will be fighting Kurdish Nationalists with a burning desire to die for our people, and we dont befoul the holy verses of the Qu'ran. We will fight for the basic rights of humans all over the world. This scenario will be the devastating for both Kurds and the USA and it will yield no fruitfull result. Then on the other hand america can say they will stay true to their mission in Iraq and side with the Kurds, in which case they will gain credibility internationally and can tell Turkey to basically to shut-up and be a good puppy. Also I dont think Turkey will be stupid enough to jepordise their efforts to join the EU or their credibility world wide. This will be the most productive of the two scenarios and if there are any future conflicts they will only be confined to Iraq and not the whole region.

Finally swara told me theres some problems with my profile which we're trying to sort out. But for those who want to contact me my email address is Sapheen@hotmail.co.uk

Saturday, February 05, 2005

The Kurdish Image

Whenever I turn on KURDSAT or look up anything to do with kurds on the net, or in books it seems the same image of the suffering kurd comes into mind. We as kurds have this image of being the poor suffering people who are either always getting crushed or are crying and dying. It is a pityful image of a people who can't help themselves and are always asking for help and begging for mercy, and moaning and complaining, and this angers me because if anything we are totally the opposite.

I believe as kurds we should be portraying the image of a proud and dedicated people who don't care who we have to fight to get what we want. Instead Kurdsat and the Kurdish websites show pictures of crying children and fleeing refugees. Do they not wish to show pictures of the vicious mountain people that we are who throughout history have menaced and terrorized every great power who has made the mistake of occupying our land? I know we have suffered alot especially in this past century, but it's not like we haven't given back as good as we got. I remember when I was little hearing stories about how 8 peshmargas would terrorise platoons of the Iraqi army, and its not like the Iraqi army ever inflicted heavy casualties on our armed forces. They like all our enemies have always targeted our civilians because they couldn't do shit to our forces. In the Halabja gassing all but 4 people were civilians.

Also throughout history almost every great power in the middle-east had elite forces that consisted of kurds. The ottomans had the janissary which recruited most of its troops from our mountain tribes. Salahadin's best foot soldiers were kurds. Not to mention he himself was a kurd and probably the only respected muslim figure in the west, even more respected then the prophet Mohammad (pbuh). Afterall Salahadin was the saviour of the Muslim people when the Crusaders were terrorising the Muslim empire.

Even if you look back to the first ever records of Kurdish people you would see that we were renound for being skilled warriors. Check out this link:

,http://www.ifs.tuwien.ac.at/~andi/somlib/data/time60/files/T294.txt

especially the bit about the Greek general Xenophon. Its the oldest record of Kurds appearing in history.

Ok maybe I may be giving a picture of a people who love nothing more than fighting, but the point im trying to make is that we need to stop making ourselves look so week and pityfull, and portray a more strong image of a people who can survive against the greatest of odds. I mean we are famous for never giving up, like even when our brothers and sisters were tortured by turks and arabs it made us even more determined to seek revenge on those who dared fight us.

I hope it is just me who sees this image and if you disagree then do say so because it would ease my mind a little.

In Hawler. I do not as of yet have any percentages or how many people registered to Vote however I will tell you how many people voted for the two main parties i.e KDP and PUK, and how many seats were given to both.

The KDP (They submitted a united list, with Yekgrtu, Socialist, the Turkmens and Communist (although they may have been different)) they recieved 317,000 votes and PUK recieved 253,000 votes. There are a certain number of seats assigned to each party, here the difference between KDP and PUK is 2 seats (23-21 KDP-PUK is what I was told it could also be like hawlati predicted 30-28). You may be wandering why there is only a two seat difference between the parties, when the difference in the vote is so much well thats because like I mentioned before the KDP list consissts of other parties who will also be assigned seats.

In D'Hok it was an out wright KDP victory, also in certain areas such as Mosul the Kurds had a very good turnout, however foul play and sabotage has damaged the vote and the results are to be confirmed. Also in other Sunii areas like Qut, and Tikrit areas Kurds also had a very good turnout.

However the best News of the day comes from Kerkuk, where it has been confirmed that the United Brotherhood List (i.e KDP, PUK and some Turkmen and Arab parties) have got more than 75% of the vote which means 43 out of 58 seats. Also, even better all the non-Kurds part of this list are all pushing for Kerkuk to be re-united with Kurdistan.